


My Mistake

by TwilightDeviant



Category: Justified
Genre: Discussion of Abortion, Follows S4, M/M, Mpreg
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-21
Updated: 2020-05-05
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:08:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 13,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23761324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TwilightDeviant/pseuds/TwilightDeviant
Summary: Tim is responsible, except when he is still young and dumb. And while he may not go off the deep end as much as Raylan, he does make his occasional mistake. Colton Rhodes is a mistake, but at least there are no consequences from sleeping with the man.
Relationships: Tim Gutterson/Colton Rhodes
Comments: 4
Kudos: 17





	1. Hey

**Author's Note:**

> I don't really know the universe in which this is set. Could be ABO or could just be a reality where male pregnancy is otherwise commonplace. I dunno. It's not really a thing I cared enough about to get caught up on. I just wanted to write the fallout of Tim and Colt expecting a kid while changing very little of S4 canon otherwise. You choose whatever explanation you want.

Tim liked to pretend he had only innocent motives when exchanging phone numbers with the man. After all, they made pleasant conversation waiting at the bottom of the hills, and it might be beneficial down the road to have Sergeant Rhodes's contact information, even if he did work with Boyd Crowder.

Somehow, the lie did not make it through a full twenty-four hours. It did not survive half that. Two beers in and Tim thought it sounded like a decent idea to give Colt a ring.

“Hello,” came the smooth voice through his receiver.

“I've had a riddle on my mind past several hours,” Tim said, giving no greeting of his own as he barreled straight into conversation. “Maybe you got its answer.”

There was a soft laugh on the other end. Whether from caller I.D. or the distinct accent of his voice, Colt knew it was him calling. “Fire away,” he permitted.

“All right, so,” Tim posed, “if a low-threat, backwoods, wannabe crime boss is handcuffed to a tree in a forest... does he make a sound?”

Colt laughed, deep and rasping, a wheeze that implied he had cigarette smoke in his lungs and a cloud of it went coughing out. He took a moment to swallow air back in. “Yes,” he answered. “Yes, he does. An incredibly _loud_ sound, in fact.” He laughed again, despite it being at his buddy's expense. “Oughta kick your partner's ass making me walk a mile out, see what the deal is, walk back to my truck for something to pick the lock, back over to the tree, and then back again to my goddamn truck.”

“Whoa,” Tim huffed, “looks like somebody got their steps in today.”

“Ain't that the truth,” Colt said. “Thought being stateside again might lower the risk of me marching back and forth for the man all day.” He inhaled too deeply for air alone as smoke and addiction filled him. “Goes to show I don't know shit.”

Speech lulled at the end of their topic, the only one introduced. In search of another, Tim set the trap for what he really called to say.

“You tired then?”

The line hesitated as it considered what his three little words might mean. “Depends.”

Tim never was one to drag his feet avoiding the point. “Well, I got a fridge more full of beer than food if you've got the time.”

When Colt spoke, there was a grin in his voice. “Deputy, I do believe you are asking me over for a very good drink or else a piss-poor dinner.”

“If you're hungry, there's a curtain of takeout menus on said fridge,” Tim offered, and it was the last bribe he would extend before he let himself sound desperate. “I fancy myself something of an interior decorator in my off hours.”

“Oh,” Colt said, and his cigarette made a hiss as it went out in a glass of liquid, “I'm hungry.”

They were both full from the individual dinners they had an hour ago, but then, food was not the menu being offered.


	2. Not a Gentleman

Tim paced his drinking while he waited. It would be poor form if the man showed up to find him sloppy drunk, and yet if he became too sober, he might rationalize himself out of the evening's intention. He had another two beers and sipped them slow. There was nothing else to do but continue waiting. The odds Tim could focus on his book— any book— were slim to none.

When Colt made the two-and-a-half hour drive in less than two, Tim knew he was not the only one anxious and excited. The premature knock on his door could only be one person, and yet on the instinct of paranoia instilled, he checked the peephole before opening up.

Colt stood in the bland white hall of the apartment building adjusting himself. He pulled his jacket nice and smooth. He raked fingers through long hair to make it more presentable. He even put a hand in front of his mouth and exhaled to check the smell of his breath. If Tim spent the transit time wondering if his hints were too subtle, those concerns were well and truly put to rest. Colt knew what this was.

“Sergeant,” Tim greeted when he finally opened the door.

“Marshal,” Colt returned as he stepped inside.

“Eh, you can call me Tim.” It was best to drop formality early on.

“Colt.”

“Can I get you a beer, Colt?” he offered.

“Yeah, Tim, sounds good.”

He studied the spartan apartment while Tim moved into the kitchen area to grab them a drink. Metal caps went ringing over the counter as a bottle opener pried them off.

“Interior design in your off hours, huh?” Colt remarked, circling back to Tim's earlier joke as he threw his eyes over the stark walls.

“Not a lot of off hours,” Tim replied.

Colt swallowed a drink and chuckled. “And you were trying to rope me into that nine-to-five with a big asterisk bullshit.”

“Offer stands, you change your mind,” Tim said. He liked to help out former military when and where he could. “Maybe if you get tired of whatever errands Boyd has you runnin'— which... dare I ask what those are?”

“Saw fetcher,” Colt answered without missing a beat. Tim grinned.

The man acquainted himself with the couch like he owned the place, spreading out and making comfortable. Tim did not take home a large sofa when he shopped for one. It suited his needs, especially since he was usually in the armchair. What that meant when he forwent the chair and Colt forwent closing his legs like a civilized animal was that it was impossible to sit on the other end of the couch without knees brushing. Military life meant nothing if not close quarters with other men, however, and it was likely neither of them would have noticed the contact— if they were not currently in the process of exaggerating every little touch.

“Really just taking a gap year,” Colt told him. “Six months into my discharge. Didn't feel like exchanging one superior for another just yet.”

Tim did not hear the conditions of Colt's discharge, assaulting and shooting a commanding officer from another company. Those details did not come out until later. If he knew more about the man's temperament and lack of impulse control, he might have reconsidered his own actions which followed. Tim did not know, however, and so he continued under the delusion that Colton Rhodes's departure from the military was a mutual agreement, as his had been.

“Yeah, I probably shoulda done something like that,” Tim replied. The mandated therapist that work liked to shove at him thought he needed more spaces away from violence. “Enjoy some of life's music before all that gunfire catches up and makes me half-deaf.”

“So take off,” Colt encouraged, a bad influence wrapped in the clothes of inspiration. “Get out of there. Just go.”

“Nah.” Tim shook his head and drank his beer. “Perks are too good, I'm afraid.” He felt like an old man already to concern himself over health insurance, vacation days, and retirement. “Plus, I still get to shoot people and be the hero.”

“Oh, god, you're one of those genuinely noble ones, aren't you?” Colt groaned. As an M.P., Tim figured the man probably saw more Boyd Crowders than Tim Guttersons on his bid.

“'Fraid so.” Tim ran the lip of the bottle against his own and added, “Most of the time.”

Colt smirked and turned towards Tim, folding his leg onto the couch. He rested his head on his hand, casting himself as the very picture of intrigue. “Tell me more about 'some of the time.'“

“Well,” Tim replied, “I invited you over, didn't I?”

Colt's eyes faded darker, as if lamps in the room conspired with him. The curve of his lip was positively indecent. “Yeah,” he said, “you sure did.”

It was not the right move and they both knew it. Raylan and Boyd liked playing enemies enough that anyone associated with them would likewise be pulled to opposite sides of the chess board before the end. But where those former coal-digging friends had no problems separating emotions from their feud, the same might not be said for any other star-crossed players caught in their game of cops and robbers.

It was a good thing, then, that Tim was only after something meaningless and not a partner to pick out curtains.

Good thing.

“So we gonna screw each other's brains out or what?” Colt stated, cutting through what remained of introductions and small talk to arrive at his visit's true purpose.

“Mama, call off the search,” Tim muttered into a pretended phone. “Your boy found himself a proper gentleman at last.”

Colt took one last and long swallow of his beer. “I don't think you want a gentleman,” he said, “not tonight.”

“That so?”

“Yeah,” Colt insisted. “All the choices you have _got_ to have for a booty call and you ring me up?” He was a cocky son of a bitch. “Yeah.”

What could Tim say? The man was right.

“Am I then to understand that you will _not_ be carrying me across the threshold?”

“Oh, come on,” Colt smirked. “I don't lack all manners.”

He carried Tim into the bedroom— with a set of legs locked around his waist and hands pulling his blond hair.

The entire scene which followed was about as rushed and messy as expected but more satisfying than anticipated.

Tim needed it.

He got it.

Any sex where he had to catch his breath after was a win in Tim's book. Colt was similarly affected as they laid there basking in the satisfaction, panting in perverse approval.

It was an afterglow too perfect to disrupt with words, and so they said nothing and did nothing for several long minutes.

Colt leaned off the bed to rummage through his clothes on the floor. Tim thought nothing of it until he heard the tapping compaction of wrapped tobacco and the click of a zippo.

“You light that in here and I will kick your naked ass,” he threatened. It was a small apartment, and he did not want the whole place stinking of cigarettes.

“The production we just put on and I'm not suppose to celebrate?” Colt complained with an unlit stick hanging from his lip.

“Oh, you can celebrate all you want,” Tim allowed. “You can celebrate on the patio. You can celebrate out front of the building. You can celebrate in your truck. I don't give two shits. Just brush your mouth out when you're done.” Tim never fell hard on the nicotine when he was a kid or when everyone else in the service sucked it to get their heads through the night. He dabbled some but quit just as quiet as he started. Some people could not kick addiction so easily, he knew, but some people could smoke anywhere outside his apartment. “Got a deposit I'd like to get back whenever I move outta this cracker box.”

“God, you are so whipped by society,” Colt said, groaning through his laugh. “Like the world's gonna end if you don't get back a few hundred bucks. You sure you were a ranger? I'd ask if Uncle Sam kept your balls if I hadn't just seen them.”

Tim did not know why he let himself take the bait, but he bit the hook and grabbed a cologne bottle on his nightstand. The glass was thick and did not break. It did dent and rip drywall when thrown. “That'll probably knock a hundred off my return, you think?”

Colt moaned low in his throat. “That was hot.” He rolled half on Tim and kissed him, squeezing his side in a fist and gripping his hair with the other.

Light property damage spurred them on for another round as soon as they were ready to go again, but after that, it was too late and both were too tired to suggest more, no matter how they might be tempted.

“Long drive back to Harlan.”

He smoked and Tim let him smoke. Tim helped him burn it with tainted inhales and billowing exhales. Sometimes, those coffin nails did hit the spot. He passed the shared cigarette back to Colt.

“Yeah, yeah.” Tim took the hint. “You can stay the night.”

“Thanks, babe.”

There was nothing special and nothing promised in Colt staying longer. Neither held delusion that they were anything but a hit and run.

Tim excused himself for a quick whore's bath in the sink, and when he came back, Colt was already cozy with eyes closed and the comforter over him. He pulled it back when Tim got close, making a pocket in strong arms. Tim never was one for cuddling, and he imagined neither was Colt.

What the hell, right?

He laid down and shuffled back until he was wrapped up in blanket and sergeant. Ordinarily, it might feel suffocating, trapping, but Tim could swallow his instincts knowing it was another soldier at his back. Instead, he felt basic comfort. He felt watched, protected, as if someone had his six for the first real time since discharge.

Somehow, he actually fell asleep.


	3. Stealth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic is finished, by the way. I'm just going over and uploading one chapter a day.

In the cold light of morning, Colt had enough slivers of sun to roll quietly to the edge of bed and figure out which clothes were his in the floor. His boots hung on a finger because he knew walking out in them would cause too much noise. Better to put them on at the door. He practically tiptoed out of the bedroom.

“I been up an hour. You don't have to sneak.”

Colt startled and looked up at Tim in the kitchen. He received a small wave and a slight toast from a coffee mug.

“Or I can close my eyes if you wanna creep out like I didn't see nothin'.” Tim covered his face with his free hand.

“No, that's...” Colt straightened up from a hunched position. “Hey, I'm glad you're up. I hated checking out not saying anything, but... long drive, you know.”

“Uh-huh.” Tim did not mind being ditched in his own home. In truth, he was wondering how to get the alleged criminal out of his apartment before he had to go into work. He did not care for being treated like an idiot, though. “Coffee for the road, rambler?”

“Uh, sure,” Colt accepted.

Tim poured coffee into his least favorite travel mug and passed it over. Colt sipped at it in his socked feet, the symptoms written on his face that he wanted to quit cordial obligations and leave already.

“Look, I don't expect anything from you,” Tim told him. “You wanna up and leave, feel free, man. I'd be doin' the same thing if tables were turned.” The biggest difference would be Tim's success in sneaking away without notice. “You and me wanted one thing from each other and we got it.”

“Yeah, we did,” Colt smirked. It was a wild and fun night. That did not mean it needed a repeat, now or ever.

“Yeah, so you're free to go whenever,” Tim permitted. “Don't offend me none.” Sooner was actually better since he had to be at work in a little over an hour, but if they were playing at not hurting each other's feelings, he did not want to be the one to press.

“Well, all right,” Colt concluded. “Thanks for the coffee, Tim.” He raised his cup to return the toast given him earlier.

When Tim said, “I'll see you around,” he did not genuinely expect to see the man again. And yet their paths crossed many more times.


	4. What Are The Odds?

When Mark left a message dragging him across the state, Tim assumed his friend fell off the wagon and needed help sorting himself out. It was a relief to find him at the V.A. and a comfort to see the man still going to addiction meetings.

The bigger surprise of his visit was when Colton Rhodes walked in the door, time and place aligning perfectly, as if fate intervened. Tim never was one to read signs. And yet when the man walked right past without noticing him or batting an eye, Tim felt compelled to draw his attention.

“Hold up,” he told Mark, interrupting his friend in crisis to address Colt. “Hey, Boyd Crowder's ride.”

A head swept side to side, looking for the source of his buddy's name and landing on Tim's face. He smiled. “Hey, Marshal Givens's sidekick.”

Tim smiled back.

“You here for a checkup?”

Colt gave some story about Bagram Lung, but Tim imagined any respiratory problems suffered by the man had more to do with the cancer sticks in his pocket than the military burning trash.

“Hey, I got a thing to take care of,” Colt added, “but maybe after, we could, uh...”

Whether he wanted to talk a little, drink a little, or screw a little, Colt left it up to Tim's imagination and decision. He had more imagination than he did opportunity.

“Got a thing to take care of.” Tim nodded his head at Mark.

“Right.” Colt was not terribly disappointed in the rain check, which made his original proposal sound insincere at best. He was a man with something greater on his mind.

“All right, well, you look after yourself.”

Colt nodded and walked off, leaving a gap of presence that was immediately filled with Mark as though the man had gossip that needed sharing.

“I know those eyes,” he said with a heavy grin. “That guy's in a world of hurt.”

“Hurt?” Tim replied, asking so subtly it almost did not have a question mark.

Mark realized the answer mattered to Tim and sobered up on his reply. “Hurt,” he repeated with a demonstration of tapping the inside of his elbow.

Oh.

Hurt.

A few things began adding up to a sum, not least of all why a man avoided honest work and honest drug testing.

Tim sure knew how to pick them.

He liked Colt and would be lying to say he never wanted to see the man again, but maybe one addict friend with his addict problems at a time was best.

“Let's get out of here and get this thing done,” Tim muttered. “I'm not feelin' so hot and I'd like to get home before midnight.”

He wanted to believe the lethargy and the heaviness in his stomach were results of bad news, but in truth, it had been there most of the day and parts of the last two as well.  
  



	5. Bother You for a Word

“Well, look here,” Boyd Crowder announced, “Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens's shadow.”

There were roughly a dozen better ways to get ahold of Colt. Tim showing up unannounced at Crowder's bar in the middle of the day was not the best, but sometimes even he was tempted to swerve into dramatics. He thought he might at least make it to a stool before being noticed.

“Need a warrant to go looking through anything,” Johnny told him, knowing his rights as well as any law enforcement officer, former convict, or civilian who watched too many crime dramas.

“Can't a fella have a drink?” Tim replied as he sauntered further in, playing that his business were so innocent.

“What'll you have?” Johnny asked, and it seemed he waited for the order simply so he could go down the line saying his establishment was out of every brand and every proof of fire water.

“Oh, I'm not drinking,” Tim dismissed, waving off the offer as though it were not his own idea. “Just here to holler at an ear behind a mop of blond hair. Any y'all seen Colt?”

“Colton!” Boyd yelled, throwing his voice towards the back room.

A moment later, the man in request emerged, looking irritated until he did not. “Yeah, what do you— oh.”

“I do believe you have a visitor,” Boyd said, and he put attentive emphasis on every syllable of the final word he spoke.

Colt nodded his head. “Marshal,” he greeted, being purposefully formal and unfamiliar in front of his law-bending buddies.

“Don't suppose I can bother you for a word,” Tim requested, “in private.” Colt gestured to the room from which he exited, but Tim declined. “Outside's fine.” He did not necessarily fear going deeper into the lion's den, but he knew what he came to say had more chance of being heard where the walls had ears.

They walked out, leaving the handful inside to wonder what business their colleague had with a lawman.

Tim did not let paranoia take him too far, but neither did he lean against the brick wall of the building. They walked halfway down the edge of the parking lot before he drew them to a stop.

“Hey, what, uh...” Colt cleared his throat. He moved in with the thought to embrace Tim or kiss him— acts of expectation, not of want. He did not follow through on the intimate obligation, born of their night together, and that was preferred on both sides. “You should've called, babe. You didn't have to come all the way down here.”

“Right, yeah, sorry to embarrass you in front of the cool kids like that.” Tim did not blow his off day on a five hour round trip for them to focus on Boyd Crowder questioning Colt's involvement with a marshal.

“I didn't mean it like—”

“You did, and I don't care.”

The man hurting his feelings was the last thing on Tim's mind. He knew they were from two different worlds when they met. He knew it when he slept with him. He knew it the entire drive from Lexington to Harlan. But a man was owed a certain allotment of bad decisions, Tim reasoned, though he might have blown through all of his by getting involved with Colton Rhodes.

“Well, no use beatin' around the bush. Guess I'll just come right out and say it,” Tim decided. “I am pregnant. You are the father. Any questions?”

“Uh...” He had a few, but his brain had to catch up first. “Uh...” Colt's mouth hung open like a dead fish as he circled through them, and at the end of his selection, he landed on asking, “Are you sure?”

“That I'm pregnant?” Tim replied. “Yeah, the four tests on my bathroom counter seem pretty convinced. That you're the daddy? Well, I may have slept with you when I shouldn't've, but I'm not that big a tramp, sergeant.”

“I didn't—”

“Mean it like that,” Tim finished for him. “Yeah, I got it.”

Colt stared at the ground as he continued to think. “Pregnant,” he murmured.

“Yeah.”

“I mean, we weren't exactly reckless,” Colt defended, and Tim wondered if the inoffensive sweetheart was still trying to subtly question paternity. It was not a remark from which he let himself take a wound.

“Eh,” Tim shrugged, “weren't exactly careful neither.” Colt was the father, for better or worse— or worse.

No take backs.

Except the one on both their minds.

“You gonna keep it?” Colt questioned, looking for all the world like he wished they were having the conversation back in the bar with a drink in his hand.

“Don't know. Ain't decided yet,” Tim said. “Still got a couple more weeks to choose it.”

Colt nodded, knowing he was not allowed to convince Tim one way or another, no matter which outcome he wanted.

“If you do... ya know, keep it,” he said, whispering the next words as if they were a secret, “I'm not a complete bastard, okay? I'll do the right thing.”

“What's that,” Tim replied, “marry me?”

“God, no,” Colt snorted, finding the thought hilarious. He might not have been a total bastard, but neither was he an upstanding gentleman from the 1940s. “I just mean you're not... completely alone... providing.”

“Don't need anything from you, don't want anything from you,” Tim said. “That's not why I came down here to tell you. Just figure man's got a right to know, ya know.”

“I know,” he answered slowly, continuing to ponder every implication, whether something be required from him or not.

“Wishin' I hadn't told you at all?” Tim questioned. A good many plans and decisions would be easier without it, but he meant what he said: Colt had a right to know.

“I mean, _kinda!_ ” the man admitted. He got points off for selfishness but a couple bonuses for honesty. “At least until you knew if you're going through with it or not.”

He was right. Tim putting hypothetical pressure on the man served no purpose, but then it also felt good to tell someone instead of holding it in like a balloon with too much air, waiting to blow. Maybe that was why he did it. Tim needed to share the news with somebody. Convention usually made that the partner in crime, the father, and while their situation was not conventional, it was still where he landed.

“Keepin' it shouldn't affect your way of life,” Tim said. “Losin' it doubly so.”

“That's bullshit and you know it,” Colt stated. “You can't stand there and expect me to believe that if the situation was reversed, you'd be fine stepping back and not letting any of this affect you.”

If the situation were reversed, Tim would probably have Child Protective Services on standby, given the suspected drug habit. Of course, that thought confirmed Colt's assertion that he could not be passive with the child.

“Just... don't put yourself out over it,” Tim insisted. “Don't get all worked up. Don't go settin' up a college fund or anything.”

“You don't trust me to come up with the scratch?”

“Don't expect you to find it honest,” Tim replied, being blunt.

There was the line, finally spoken out loud. Tim was an officer of the law. Colt was involved in criminal activity, though its exact nature remained unknown to him, out of willful ignorance more than anything. Divided by the stakes they set, the two of them were not about to start playing house.

“Listen,” Colt spoke, pleading for understanding, “I've got some stuff with Boyd I gotta wrap up, all right? Something big. But after that—” he pushed a hand through his hair— “maybe... maybe he and I go our separate ways, okay? Maybe I... maybe I get a real job.”

Tim nodded his head. It was a nice fairytale for bedtime but not a legitimate plan on which to count. “Okay, Colt.”

“Okay?” He smiled, relieved that Tim believed him without realizing he did not.

“Okay.”

A damn nice fairytale.

“Hoo!” Colt exhaled. “God, I need a drink and a smoke.” To his defense, the man did have a lot of information to process in a much smaller window than his partner. “Can I get you something?” he offered, swinging his thumb back at the bar.

“Yeah, I probably shouldn't,” Tim said, “you know, all things considered.” He had several nights of hard drinking before he found out— and a couple softer evenings since. It was probably best not to push his luck.

“Shit,” Colt swore. “Damn, sorry. I...” He was comedically bad at handling the situation. That alone made Tim decide the drive was just about worth it.

They smiled, having irrational fondness for each other despite all the reasons they should not.

“Hey, look,” Colt said, “it's a slow day at the office if you wanna blow it off with me, kill some time over at my place before you drive all the way back to Lexington.”

“What, for a drink?” Tim mocked.

“I was thinking something a little more horizontally inclined.” The fingertips of his flat hand went from north to east. “Unless that's also on the list of unacceptable behaviors for the dearly expecting.”

Tim shook his head and laughed, more amused at his gall than the suggestion. “Boy, you got a set, don't ya?”

“Yes, I do,” Colt agreed. “And apparently a very fertile set at that.”

Tim knew he was not supposed to humor the man, but he messed up by grinning. “You'll forgive me turning down the invitation,” he said, “but I'm not feeling super sexy or super into criminals right now.” Tim had a bloated sensation from a barely begun pregnancy and a clearer head than last time about jumping into bed with Colton Rhodes.

The man was not terribly offended by the letdown— disappointed perhaps. He shrugged. “Offer stands,” he said. “Change your mind, gimme a call. We'll meet someplace halfway. 'Cause it'd take a hell of a lot for me to not be turned on by that ass of yours, marshal.”

“You sure know how to make a girl blush, don't ya.”

Tim kicked at loose gravel and watched the dust coat his boot. He did not want to stay. He did not want to leave.

“You gonna tell 'em?” he asked, nodding his head to the bar and its criminal element. If the man wanted to tell, he was going to tell. It was not like Tim could lock the information back down after giving it freely.

“Are we... telling people?” Colt questioned.

“Hell no,” Tim scoffed. “Actually figure I got a few more months before my boss looks at me and says, 'Hey, Tim?'“ His Art impression sounded good for only speaking two words.

“My lips are sealed,” Colt swore. It was debatable how well his word could be trusted, but Tim forfeited his right to worry about it. “Just, uh... You'll let me know, right?” he asked. “Let me know what you decide, either way?”

“You know you put me in a situation to say, 'Yes,' on either outcome so you'll walk away from this shit, right?” Tim replied.

“I know I do,” Colt said, “but I know you won't.”

Tim would not manipulate freewill away from the man. He could disapprove of the way Colt lived his life. He could even nag him about it, guilt him about it, but he could not make the decision to quit for him. The choice had to be earnest and sincere or else the prospects of its longevity were unassured.

They both had some big choices to make.

“I'll let you know then,” Tim promised. He had his own thoughts to finish sorting, but after that, he would let the man know how to panic and prepare his own reaction to the potential life event.

“All right,” Colt nodded. “Thanks, I guess. Or fuck you, I haven't decided yet.” It was a big development in what was obviously a troubled time and a chaotic epoch. He meant nothing personal by the remark and Tim knew that.

“Right back at ya.”

Tim was in a better place than Colt. That did not mean it was a good one.

They ended the conversation the same way it began: feeling obligated to touch or otherwise be sweet but not following through.

No one came out of the bar or peeked through any curtains, but Tim also noticed that when Colt opened the door, Boyd was standing just inside, prepared with a question or two. Tim wondered what tale Colt would spin about their conversation, but he did not obsess over it. He had more than enough to deal with already.

East Kentucky could mind itself for awhile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Behold the actual mpreg! I love a good disaster.
> 
> (PS: I love comments and kudos. ♥)


	6. Funny When Things Go Wrong

Interesting how one word could wreck Tim's world like it did.

He lost Mark, and that hurt. His friend was on an unfortunate path from which he did not want saving. Maybe he was going to die one way or another— if not the bullet, then the Oxy. Inevitable or not, the death hurt. The word hurt almost as bad.

That one word, two damning syllables: Bagram.

It was a hell of a text to get in the middle of the day. Tim messaged Mark for clarification but never heard a reply. He pushed it to the back of his mind, suspecting the word was sent by an unclear head. More serious implications did not attach until he got a call from the local P.D.

Tim made a long drive to witness a horrific scene and lie to law enforcement.

He had no idea why Mark texted him instead of calling 911.

He did not know the context of “Bagram.”

He had no leads on who could have committed the double homicide.

Lies.

Somehow, the road back to Lexington stretched out more than usual, with asphalt and paint always lying past a horizon he could not meet. And when Tim could no longer endure the cage of his car and the cellmate of his thoughts, he pulled onto the shoulder of empty highway and screamed at some trees.

The trees did not seem to care that the father of his unborn child just murdered his friend.

The worst part was that Tim could not be certain why he pushed ignorance with the cops the way he did. Was it that he wanted to exact his own revenge on Colt, to make the man look at him and confess what he did?

Was it because he did not want Colt arrested for murder?


	7. Sinners Welcome

It was a day of good news as Tim sat in his car watching Colt sit in his, outside Crowder's bar. He got to see the man go to work on himself.

Packet pulled out. Sleeve went up. Sleeve went down. Zen came upon him.

Enough years of sniping and Tim learned to focus on the tiny, blurry details and see the image, even without a scope or binoculars. It was a hell of a way to have the drug use confirmed— and not even something pedestrian like Oxycontin, no. Colt went the distance and shot himself up with heroin.

It was not as if Tim expected his one-night-stand to hear their complicated news and sober up, better himself. He did not expect it. So why did witness of the opposite incite such disappointment?

Colt reveled in his high, let it calm him and fix him, but then the job at hand (whatever it may be) pressed forward with its obligation, starting his car and putting it in drive.

Tim followed at a distance.

He could pull Colt over, say the car was weaving, order a drug test. The man would go to jail. He could do that.

He did not.

Instead, Tim led his S.U.V. down dirt roads, tracing distant clouds of kicked up dust. Colt took him to an erected house of worship, one he read about in the papers regarding a snake-carrying preacher who was bit, an account he heard about in reports that asserted Crowder's perfectly innocent involvement.

His man went inside.

Tim hesitated around the tent, wondering if he should move closer in with Colt and give away his position or continue tailing in hopes he might witness something more incriminating. The one-handed chokehold Colt had on a woman inside answered his question.

“Let her go!” Tim yelled. “Right now, let her go!”

Colt released the woman, stricken by the firm tone and the fear from being caught. When he turned, heartbroken surprise corrupted his expression. “Anyone but him,” those soulful, clouded eyes seemed to say. “This isn't your business,” the mouth spoke. Nothing would make him happier than if his marshal shadow, the person carrying his child, walked away and forgot everything he saw.

“I'm makin' it my business,” Tim responded. Colt had nothing more to say and no eye contact to make. Being smart enough to keep his mouth shut took him. Shame kept him. “Tell me it was something stupid,” Tim demanded, implored. “Tell me you needed the money because of some shit with Boyd.”

“What money?” Colt replied, playing dumb or being dumb in his drugged out state.

“From the dealer,” Tim clarified, exorcising ambiguity.

“Dealer?” The man was former police. He knew not to give an inch or implicate himself in any way.

“And my friend Mark,” Tim added on, biting on the words as they scraped at his fresh wound. “Tell me you didn't go out and do something stupid because of...” He hesitated. “Because of...” Tim could not say the words. “For money.”

“You didn't want my money,” Colt replied. He confirmed nothing, but Tim felt a slight weight lifted as he convinced himself the robbery and murder had nothing to do with the kid, supporting their kid. People did not die for it.

He convinced himself of that because he did not want to hear evidence to the contrary.

“Did you kill my friend?”

Colt did not answer, but the remorseful stare at a dirt floor could write a book.

“What was the money for?”

Colt did not speak to him, did not justify or nullify his distress. He said nothing.

“What was it for?” Tim pressed.

Colt could say anything in the world, and as long as it had nothing to do with the pregnancy, Tim could make his peace with it. The man could say anything. He could say anything!

He said nothing.

Tim's gun hand was steady when it wanted to shake.

They stood in stalemate with Tim having plenty of reasons to arrest the man and Colt making him aware of the gun sticking out of his pants. He wanted to leverage it and back himself out of the tent, leave, Tim could tell. He even pulled, carrying through on a threat that might have been deemed empty if the man were in his right mind. He was not, though. Heroin made his decisions, and heroin felt nothing for Tim, for the microscopic thing inside him.

Boyd Crowder's voice never was a relief before or since, but in that moment, Tim almost welcomed the sound, the interloper.

“Miss Cassie?”

Tim allowed Boyd to break tension but did not favor the notion of being suddenly outnumbered.

“You stay right where you are,” he ordered the man. “Deputy U.S. Marshal.”

“I know who you are, deputy,” said Boyd. “We spoke amicably just the other day, did we not? You, me, and our friend Colt here, isn't that right?”

“A lot's seemed to change since then,” Tim replied. It was less than a week ago, and yet in that time, he went from lukewarm feelings on Colt and their child to wishing he never met the man.

“Only when we change them,” Boyd said, sounding wise despite having few facts and speaking just to get his way. He did not have a single care for the troubles swirling inside Tim's brain. “Miss Cassie, I offer my deepest apologies for my associate's behavior,” the boss extended. “Now, with your permission, officer, I just want to take my friend with me. I will make sure that his transgressions are properly punished. You have my word.”

“Long list,” Tim scoffed. He did not have half of those transgressions, and yet they were enough. “Were you part of what he did to my friend?” he asked Boyd. “You know about it? Make him do it?”

“I am certain I have no idea the matter you are discussing,” he said. It was a lie to protect his crimes or else confirmation Colt acted alone— to an end of his own benefit, as with a child of his making. “Colt,” Boyd ordered, “put the gun away.”

“He won't shoot,” Colt claimed, testing Tim and confusing Boyd. “He can't.”

“Maybe he's lookin' for a reason,” Tim contradicted.

“Colton,” Boyd warned. His stern tone corralled the rogue. Colt returned his gun to the waist of his jeans. “Now, all we want,” he said to Tim, “is to leave in peace. Need I remind you that you are an officer of the peace?”

Tim glared at the man, hating him for his ignorance. He had no idea what was going on between him and Colt. And yet Tim was grateful Boyd Crowder intervened, that he deescalated the situation and got Tim to put away his gun so everyone could leave. He needed outward influence upon him because he did not know what his finger was going to do on that trigger.

He did not know.

It was after that Tim finally pulled Colt's jacket and read the circumstances of his military discharge.


	8. Roadside Attraction

When Tim said he had the number for Crowder's Iraq and Afghan vet, he was surprised Art settled for his vague explanation why.

Colt stranded them between two broken down cars Tim suspected were live, and by the end of one happy little anecdote, he felt sure of it.

With the story ended, Tim knew the call would soon conclude as well. He turned his phone from speaker back to earpiece, unsure of what non-work-related speech the man might say if the call veered from work relations. His boss was still riding shotgun, after all.

“Let me ask you something,” Tim posed, entertaining a wild thought of self-importance and general self-esteem. “Would you care if I died?”

Colt's answer faltered as if he had to decipher and decide his own emotions, as though he were not master of them nor of the actions from his hands. And yet when he spoke, there was no doubt in his reply. The verdict was clear and confident. “Greatly,” he said.

Tim wished he could doubt that to simplify his own emotions, but the man was only most of a lost cause.

“Timothy,” he went on, being frustratingly formal, “if you're in any sort of dangerous work situation right now, maybe you should walk away. Perhaps if your, uh, adversary sees a lone man walk out, unarmed and with his hands up, he might suspect external— sorry, internal— circumstances and let you leave.”

“That so?” Tim countered. He never knew whether to believe the man or not, but this one did not sound like a lie. Tim could leave his weapons in the car and hike it out of there with his hands up, leave a half-dozen men to die.

“I believe so, yes.” Colt would let him go. Apparently, loose feelings for Tim or sentimentality towards their little development meant something to him. “So maybe you should—”

“Me?” Tim interrupted. “Nah, I'm just... sittin' at home, writin' a book.” Colt knew he lied. “Yourself?”

“Sitting at home,” Colt lied with a disappointed exhale, “drinking a beer.”

“Well, I'll let you get back to it,” Tim dismissed.

“You too.”

There was finality to the disconnected phone call, and Tim almost regretted his role as spectator when it passed by. He felt as though if he kept Colt's ear longer, maybe they could come to some sort of agreement. Maybe they could still work things out.

But the call was over.

“Dare I ask the meaning of half that shit you just said?” Art questioned. There was a noticeable tipping point when the conversation turned too familiar, even if all he heard was the one side.

“That your concern right now?” Tim replied.

“No.”

“No.”

Tim went back to his predicament like he was wearing a bulletproof vest. There was a layer of protection that might spare him from his adversary.

It might not.


	9. I'll Quit Today

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh no! The final showdown in the church! ToT

They found themselves, again, beneath that canvas tent, away from Kentucky sun with hands full of metal full of bullets.

Boyd was not there to stop them this time.

“What do you think you're doin'?” Tim derided, pointing out the absurdity of his partner's casual action.

Polluted air answered the question which Colt's words clarified. “I'm smoking.”

Inhale.

Tim remembered how it felt to have that brand in his own lungs, to have that man on his skin.

Exhale.

“I would have done anything to make it normal,” Colt said, “to make us simple.”

“Well, clearly that's not true,” Tim argued. Colt has so many opportunities to turn everything around, and yet there he was going on like he wanted to move in together, rub Tim's belly, hold the thing when it was born.

“I told you I had one more job with Boyd,” he stressed. “I just... had to finish it.”

“And killin' my friend in the meantime,” Tim asked, “killin' Mark, what you call that, extra credit?”

“Collateral damage.”

Inhale.

Remorse.

“I'm sorry about what happened to your friend Mark,” he said, and Tim believed it against his better instinct. “But I think most of him died somewhere in Kandahar.”

“Only part I'm concerned about is the one that died here.”

Tim did not need the man's empathetic introspection. He did not need to hear Colt explain why dead men did drugs. He did not want to wonder if most of Sergeant Rhodes was in front of him, or if most of that man was shot and stabbed and exploded overseas, taking damage with every horror. The world no longer existed where all of him lived.

He goaded Tim to kill the rest.

“Last time I'm telling you. Put your weapon on the ground.”

Inhale.

Exhale.

“I guess I'll quit today.” Colt raised his arm.

Tim fired.

Two bullets went right into Colt's chest and he fell. He cried. He wheezed. He choked.

Tim rushed to his side and fell on his knees. He pushed away the enemy weapon on protocol, removing it from Colt's reach. Then he put his hands on gushing destruction and pressed.

“Hurts, don't it?”

Tim shot dozens of people and yet, to date, never took a bullet himself. He had plenty of secondhand accounts, however, and they all reported the same thing: pain.

“Can't breathe?” he asked against unproductive gasping. “Yeah, it's 'cause I missed your heart, hit the lung.” He was no doctor, but Tim knew the man's lung deflated and filled with blood as he spoke. He kept one hand on the gunshot wound and used the other to fish his phone from his pocket.

“Somebody up there must love you, lettin' me have a signal all the way out here.” They were out of civilization, but close enough to touch its edge that he had a bar of service— two if he leaned just right. “This is Deputy U.S. Marshal Tim Gutterson,” he told dispatch. “Got a perp with a G.S.W. Send an ambulance to my location.” It was difficult to describe a church tent in the middle of nowhere, but he managed.

Tim pushed Colt and rolled him onto his side to prevent further pressure on the drowning lung. The man heaved in futile agony the entire time.

“I know,” Tim said, cool when he should be in some form of panic. In truth, the high stakes of it all felt like going home. “I know.”

He got blood in Colt's hair when he petted it in comfort, a stark contrast of red on yellow. For a moment, Tim's world shrank. It was him and Colt on a battlefield, nothing and no one else.

Hold him. Wait for the medic.

It was only his enduring duty that finally made Tim shout: “Any you ladies thinkin' about walking out of here, I suggest you go ahead and think it over a second time. This is not the day to try my patience. Take a seat, all of you.”

That sat without a word, all three of them: Ava, Cassie, and Ellen May. Tim wondered if he looked wild and raging. He was not to be reckoned with, for certain. They did not test it.

The ambulance took longer than Tim wanted but about as long as he expected. Colt was unconscious by the time they arrived, but he still had a pulse. It was something. It was hope for an outcome Tim tried to convince himself did not matter. If the man died, he died.

If the man died, he died.

The paramedics were good. Tim offered assistance where he could, but they had it. They stabilized Colt, loaded him onto a stretcher, and pushed all of it into the ambulance. Tim wanted to ride along. Being an officer with a perp, he was obligated to go. But there was more he had to look after in the tent. He came all that way and did what he did to get Ellen May. It would be counterintuitive to wander off, leaving the girl to chance.

Before the E.M.T. could drive off, Tim pulled him aside for one last word.

“Don't give him anything strong for the pain,” he instructed.

“Sir, we can't—”

“Man's an addict trying to kick,” Tim partially lied. “He wouldn't want it. And when he wakes up and cries out he's hurtin', he doesn't want it then either. It's just the pain and the drugs talkin'.”

It was a little personal.

Colt was bound to have a fun hospital stay, hurting from the holes in his lungs, the subpar painkillers, and the withdrawal. It was small contribution to his reparations— if he survived it all.

“I didn't think you missed,” Raylan spoke, pointing out Tim's lacking marksmanship as a playful dig or else as a somber observation.

“First time for everything, I guess.”

Tim did not have to explain himself to the man who once missed the mark on someone with whom his younger self dug coal.


	10. Paperwork

“I been racking my brain the last several hours. Maybe you can help,” Art implored. “What all can we actually get this, uh—” he looked at the open folder on his desk— “Colton Rhodes on?”

Tim had the sensation of shock beat out of him a decade ago overseas. Because of that, he did not know what he was feeling, but it delayed his speech and clogged up his thoughts like chewing gum on mechanical gears. He was in Art's office late at night when he wanted to be home, staring at a beer he should not drink.

“Well,” he sighed, “he killed my friend Mark.”

“Okay, that's a start,” Art said with a nod. It was not a good start because it gave Tim personal motive for shooting the man, but they could smooth that out with Internal Affairs later. “And he admitted this to you?” Art questioned. “And please tell me it was in front of the three ladies we have as witnesses.”

“Not in so many words,” Tim answered. “Called him 'collateral damage' and that he was sorry about it.”

“So he didn't say the actual words, 'Deputy Gutterson, I killed your friend Mark'?”

“No, sir, he did not.”

“And the locals don't have any evidence that can tie him to it?”

“As of yet, no.”

“I hate when former law enforcement goes dirty,” Art groaned. Those who followed evidence knew how to hide it. “Look,” he consoled, “I am sorry about your friend, but let's back burner that one for a minute. What else we got on this guy?”

“Caught him about to shoot Ellen May,” Tim said “Probably the preacher's sister too before he left.”

“Yeah, but he didn't,” Art replied. “So all we got there is him scaring the shit out of some women. Maybe we can charge him on assault for it. Anything more?”

“Walked in on him choking the sister another time,” Tim said, “if she's willin' to testify about it.”

“Okay, another assault,” Art counted. “What else?”

Tim shook his head. It was undeniable that the man orchestrated more damage and crime, but he could not prove anything. Unless locals tied Colt to Mark and the dealer, that was about it.

“Two low-level assaults and attempted murder of a federal officer,” Art summarized. “That'll do for now, I—”

“No.”

“Huh?”

“He wasn't... gonna shoot me,” Tim muttered.

“Uh-huh,” Art replied, not entirely or not at all convinced. “And you know this how exactly?”

Tim stared at the back of a tilted picture frame on the man's desk, seeing but not seeing it. “On account of the fact I'm pregnant,” Tim told him, a secret that had to come out with the boss sooner or later. “He knows it, too.”

Art was expectedly and justifiably floored by the graceless announcement. There was a good amount of information to unpack from it, and that was if it were an ordinary discussion between supervisor and employee, a state which that one already transcended.

“And how the hell does he know that?”

“Feelings hurt I told him before you?” Art did not answer the asinine question. Tim blew a great, indulgent sigh before saying, “I told him... 'cause he's the baby daddy.”

Art had only one word of immediate reply, but it did wonders for conveying his innermost thoughts: “Shit.”

After collecting himself, there followed a classic tirade about how Raylan used to be his only concern, about how the personal connection caused a conflict of interests in what should have been a clean shooting, about how Art was going to have to meet with the D.A. and assess their options in prosecuting Colton Rhodes. Thank God there were witnesses, at least.

It was a mess though, to be certain. Because Tim now had possible motive for wanting to shoot a man, and because Colt had motive for not wanting to fire his gun at all.

He was never going to shoot. Tim told himself that.

He convinced himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Am I weak and problematic for not killing Colt and giving him light charges for arrest? Absolutely. But I'm fine with that. Colt shouldn't have died in the first place. It was such a waste. And even if he did have to die, not after one season! I wasn't done with him yet. I really loved his character, and I miss him.


	11. Wanna Talk About It?

Colt was just another shot, another feather in Tim's cap— and not even a lethal one. Raylan knew they had a connection, though, even if he did not know how deep it ran, and so he did a drive-by check-up on Tim after the fact.

“If you need someone to talk to,” Raylan offered.

“I got Rachel.”

“You got Rachel.”

They both knew Raylan was less of a rock in trying times and more a dirt clod. If a loved one needed a person shot, there was no one better to take on the shootee. He tripped on the emotions part, however, not that Tim was any sort of master himself. But he had Rachel if he needed someone.

She came to him first.

She came when Tim did not want company, but he let her in regardless. He was smart enough to know he might not want the thing he needed.

Tim opened the door to his apartment and closed it behind her.

“Should you be drinking?” Rachel asked, an unconventional greeting but one she considered a priority.

“Oh, absolutely,” Tim replied. He deserved it after everything he suffered through the past few days.

“Art wanted me to check on you,” she said. “And he thought I might do that job better... if I knew.”

Tim sighed and slapped his hand on the drywall. “Boss is a blabbermouth,” he huffed. He was not supposed to worry about the pregnancy getting out because his superior was telling people. H.R. probably had rules against that.

“For good reason, it seems,” Rachel defended. She reached for the beer bottle in Tim's hand, and he let her take it. “Should I ask how many you've had?”

“Tonight, or...?” Bad answer.

“I'm not your mother.”

“Then how do you explain the strong family resemblance?”

“But you know you can't be drinking, right?” They could joke after she scolded him. “They got all kinds of research now on what it does, how it affects development. Don't tell me you haven't heard any of that.”

Tim nodded his head and rolled his eyes. Yes, he knew those proven causes and effects behind drinking while pregnant. He also knew something Rachel did not.

“Probably don't matter too much anyway,” he murmured. “Pretty much decided I'm not keepin' the thing.”

“And when did you decide this?” she asked. She led Tim back to the couch and made him sit. “It happen to come along about the time you shot Rhodes, or was it before?”

“Mm,” Tim pondered, “right around 'Bagram.'“

“Didn't know you were in Bagram,” Rachel said.

“Not much, no.”

He was not allowed to leave his moping there. Rachel pressed him for the full details, horrifying as they were. Tim gave them up, all the dirty facts, all the perfect setup for a person to ask him what else he expected to happen, if not the conclusion he received.

“So,” Rachel summarized, skipping larger facts to return to her original question, “you started leaning to not keeping the baby when he killed your friend, that right?”

“Yeah, it sounded like a pretty good reason,” Tim replied. It was the sort of outwardly passive, inwardly destructive statement that deserved a drink. Too bad Rachel had him drying out.

“And before that?”

“Before what?”

“Before your man went off the deep end,” she said, “how were you feeling about keeping the baby then?”

“Hadn't decided then either,” he told her. “Look... it's not like I'm in the best place for it,” he admitted, “financially, emotionally... mentally.” Tim knew he was a mess. He was not the sort of fool who thought a baby could fix him with purpose. Instead, he was mature enough to accept that it would only ruin two lives.

“If Rhodes was a good man,” Rachel posed, “would you—”

“Hold up.” Tim closed his eyes. “That's a big pretend. Gimme a minute.” He made her wait several seconds before saying, “Okay, go.”

“If he was a good man,” she repeated, “and if you weren't doing this all on your own, if he were there for you... what then?”

Tim opened his eyes. “What do you mean, 'What then?'“

“Would you want the baby then?”

“I didn't want it to start with,” he stated. Mistakes were mistakes, and he made one.

“Look... idiot,” Rachel expressed, “I'm trying to say that I'm here for you.”

“Oh.”

Rachel was one of the best coworkers he could ask for, always there, always dependable. He simply never thought their relationship went much past that.

“It's not... your responsibility,” Tim told her. It was not fair that she felt obligated to jump down in the hole he dug.

“I know that,” she said. Rachel was perfectly aware she did nothing to gain a burden in her life. “But if responsibilities are all that's keeping you from following through, I want to help.” She was sincere. “I want you to make the choice based on what you actually want to do, okay?”

Tim nodded his head. “Okay.” Somehow, her selflessness made his decision more difficult. It was no longer what he could manage but what he wanted to manage.

Did he want the baby?

“We'll all be here for you,” Rachel offered, extending the support of their little office. He knew it was true. After all, she might not be there at all that night had Art not let concern peck at him. “Except maybe—”

“Not Raylan,” they said in unison.

The man was a dirt clod. But if Tim wanted Colt shot (again), he knew whom to call.

His phone rang, vibrating aggressively on the wooden top of the coffee table. Tim grabbed it.

“Yeah?” He listened. “Okay... all right. All right. Thanks, man.” He ended the call and slid his phone back onto the table. “Officer we got on Colt,” Tim told Rachel. “Called to let me know asshole's finally out of surgery.”

“And how is asshole doing?” she asked, knowing Tim cared even though he pretended he did not.

“He'll live.” Tim knew he would. His shots did not miss. “Lung was a bit of swiss cheese, but they've patched it now. Doctor's not expecting any complications. Long recovery ahead, though, and he'll be in prison to do it.”

“He'll get to rest in the infirmary there,” Rachel comforted, “probably be in solitary a little while after.” She wanted to keep down any concern Tim might have that he just gave the man a handicap before sentencing him to the general population.

“Good thing, with a mouth and an attitude like that,” Tim muttered. Colton Rhodes was already due a few enemies on the inside. He simply had not made them yet. He would.

“You gonna talk to him before he gets transferred?”

“No,” Tim lied.


	12. Can I Ask You Something?

Tim let Rachel out around one o' clock, and she went with the promise all his alcohol went with her. The loss took away a lot of his options over what to do as he stared at the wall for the next four hours, thinking about everything and nothing. He dozed off once or twice, but it was not a night of rest.

At five in the morning, he finally called it quits, took a shower, and left.

He was not going to work.

The exciting perk about having a badge in his pocket was that it allowed Tim to bypass every nurse or other employee who said the hospital was not yet open for visiting hours or that this particular patient was not allowed any visitors.

He dismissed the officer outside the door, told the man to get himself a coffee in the cafeteria— a long coffee.

Sleeping Beauty looked like shit.

A tube protruded his chest, outlined by the thin sheet. A smaller line hooked around his ears and plugged into his nostrils to supply pure oxygen. The heart monitor on his finger beeped at a rhythm Tim assumed was positive. The handcuff on each wrist and each bed rail kept him from going anywhere when he woke up. But there was a peace about him, all things considered. That almost seemed unfair.

Tim pulled the provided chair closer, dragging its wooden legs on old linoleum. The scraping sound was loud and unholy, but he did not care to make it quiet. In fact, he meant not to. He even turned on the light, letting it stream into closed eyes, just bright enough to penetrate the lids.

If Tim's petty instructions were followed, Colt was not on medication strong enough to knock him out completely. It took a few minutes, but the fluttering eyelashes confirmed that was so.

He groaned and winced, as was to be expected. Tim turned down the brightness of the light when Colt looked like he wanted to open his eyes. The first thing he saw was the man who shot him.

“Mm,” he protested, a whining noise of pain and distress.

“I wouldn't suggest you try and talk,” Tim said. “Heard they had to intubate in surgery. Throat's probably abused halfway to hell.”

“What...” Colt spoke in defiance. “What are...”

“Relax,” Tim huffed, “I don't know enough about medicine to kill you and make it look natural.” He added: “That's why I'm gonna slip the nurse $5k on my way out.”

Colt recognized it as a joke, and it was that humor which assured him Tim's presence was not a threat. He did not force himself to speak again, but one glance down at his own body managed to ask enough of a question Tim caught on.

“Right,” he said. “Well, I dunno how much stock I put into the immortality of my soul, but I figured it was probably best to not go killin' a man in church.” Like hell was he giving Colt the honest answer, whatever that answer was.

There was no reply to it. Whether it hurt too much to speak or else Colt intentionally had nothing to say, he did not try, not through words nor gestures.

Tim had a question for him, and despite the complexity of its meaning, the answer could be given very simple.

“So, assuming you've ever seen a piece of fiction in your life, you know the drill,” he coached. “One blink for yes, two for no. Got that?”

One obstinate blink.

“Good.”

They could have half of a conversation.

“You're gonna live. Anybody tell you that?”

One blink.

“You're goin' to prison. Know that?”

One blink. One sarcastically shaken handcuff.

“You're a grade A son of a bitch. Heard that one?”

Colt did not grant him reply, not that he expected it. He simply wanted to let the man know his opinion.

“I got a lot ridin' on this next question,” Tim spoke. “We have a, uh, pool goin' down at the office,” he lied. “So, for all the marbles... were you, Colton Rhodes... going to shoot when you drew?”

He waited for an answer more important than he wanted to admit.

It came.

One blink.

Tim swallowed and looked at the floor to gather his thoughts. It hurt more than he expected, if he were being honest with himself. Going there for confirmation was a bad idea. People were right to say ignorance was bliss. Damn.

A rattling handcuff drew back his attention. Colt stopped shaking the chain and stared at Tim to blink quickly, two times. He waited a second and did it again, repeating himself with emphasis. “No, no, no.”

The man was a bastard and he liked to put up a front, but not even he could maintain a lie about trying to murder the person carrying his child.

No.

Tim breathed a sigh of relief, a show of weakness he should keep hidden. Sometimes, the stoic facade had to crack a little. “Well,” he sniffed, “you just won me fifty bucks, so...” He should have lied upon his lie, he realized, telling Colt he lost money betting the other way. Instead, Tim told on himself that he sought Colt's non-violence towards him.

The larger fallout of the confession, however, was to revisit the idea that Colt was not going to shoot. He pulled his gun so Tim would fire on him, good old fashion suicide by cop. Colt wanted to die in the tent. Tim did not let him.

“Look, this ain't the easy way, for damn sure,” Tim acknowledged. He took a man who wanted free from all his problems and added on another handful. “You're goin' to prison, and that's just the way of it. Good news for you is we don't have much to actually charge you on.” Art would yell at Tim some more if he knew the marshal was in the room with their arrestee and showing the man all the cards in their hand. “If Boyd's half as loyal to you as you are to him, he'll get you a lawyer worth a damn that will advise making a plea deal. I repeat,” Tim emphasized, “do not fight. Make plea deal.”

Somewhere, Art Mullen's blood pressure rose without explanation.

“Understood?”

Colt closed his eyes in slow affirmation. There was no innocence in his actions, and a lawyer would not find it in court, no matter how skilled. Colt was guilty of every accusation— and then some.

“Tim,” whispered an abused voice in a pain-filled scratch of tissue grinding on tissue, “I'm... sorry, okay?”

It was a very large blanket to cover a large assortment of actions. That man did a lot to hurt him in a very short window of time, and the most shocking aspect was how everything was incidental. Tim shuddered to think of the damage he might have incurred if Colt actually intended him harm. Side effects of the impersonal cut deep enough on their own.

“Okay, Colt.”

The apology was noted, not accepted.

“You were helping out a friend.” Tim understood the inexplicable, nearly inhuman compulsion to be there when a war buddy called, no questions asked.

The concept was understood, not excused.

When they cleared the way of minor topics, the inevitable remained in their path, demanding to be addressed.

“Baby?” rasped Colt.

“Little late for pet names, don't ya thing?” Tim derided. When Colt opened his mouth to clarify, Tim shut him up. “I know what you mean, asshole. Yeah,” he confirmed, “still a baby in there.” Colt looked in the area of his stomach while Tim tried to pretend he did not have one. “I'm gonna keep it,” he decided, surprising even himself. “Kind of a recent decision, if I'm being honest. Only made it about three minutes ago.” He decided right around the time he got a couple blinks. “Got some lifestyle changes to make and some money to start stickin' back, but... yeah, a baby.”

He was going to have the baby of the man he shot, the man who killed his friend. Tim knew he did not need to think about it very hard or very long, but he also anticipated that dam would break sometime in the next seven months.

“Good.”

He might have been offended by Colt's approval of Tim not getting rid of his kid, but it meant more than that. Before, neither of them knew how they felt about their mistake coming to life. Tim was still on the fence, deciphering his own feelings. But the discharged soldier, the drug addict, the suicidal criminal, the man going to prison with nothing to pull him through the other side, he now had something to look forward to.

He was going to have a child.


	13. Phone Call

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last two chapters in Colt's POV. Just worked best. Or I liked it best, anyway.

“Rhodes, phone call.”

Colt followed the guard from his cell and sneered when the man hovered over him and the grimy phone.

“Colton Rhodes, whom may I ask is speaking?” he said into the receiver, being an ass and knowing it.

“Baby boy,” announced his caller. “Seven pounds, ten ounces— nineteen inches long,” said Raylan Givens, reciting numbers like the end of a fishing tournament. “Ten fingers, ten toes, and everything where it ought to be.”

Colt had a son.

Tim had his son.

“Uh... all right.” He tried to process the new information, being floored despite spending months in a drab box not thinking about much else. Prison was where boredom was born, lived, and died. Colt kept his eye on the months, weeks, days, but it was impossible to guess exactly when it would happen. “A boy.”

“Now, I didn't make this call 'cause Tim asked me to, even though he did,” Raylan informed. “Still too hopped up on pain meds to do it himself, I reckon. C-section, by the way, 'cause the little bastard got your big head. Congrats.” Colt wondered how much the kid looked like him and how much Tim hated that it did. “No, I'm calling you, Mr. Rhodes, because I thought it'd be a good idea to let you know.”

“Well, thank you, Marsh—”

“Let you know what you cannot, will not have,” he interrupted, reminding Colt of his incarceration and all the bridges he burned getting there. “I hope to God the ride down was worth it, 'cause now you have a son but it ain't through nothing but your one time physical contribution.” Colt had a son, Raylan told him, but he was not a father. “Tim's not half so strong as we all like to think, or if he is, the weaker moments, they even things out,” Raylan stated. “I had to watch the man, a damn near alcoholic, dry out for the health of that little boy. And the whole time, I was thinkin' what a good for nothin' piece of addict shit the boy's daddy is.”

“I'm not a bad man, Raylan,” Colt defended, having no leg to stand on and not caring. He was not a villain.

“If I had a nickel.”

“I don't have to convince you.” It was the truth, and Colt was proud to flaunt the fact. “I can't shake that little shit,” he said. He thought about Tim a lot— and not only when the holes in his chest hurt. “I know he thinks about me too.” Colt turned into the wall and dragged his hand down painted brick. “I know he feels... something.” Tim did not kill him when he should have. That had meaning.

“If by some absolute miracle you weasel yourself back into his life again, I gotta wonder,” Raylan posed, “is it what a good man would do?”

He lassoed Colt with his own claim of virtue and hogtied him with it.

“I've been, uh, improving myself,” Colt claimed to his spontaneous parole board. “I'm trying to... to be the man I was, all right? Before...” Before his discharge, before drugs, before Boyd— all of it. “I'm trying to rehabilitate myself in here. I mean, that's the point, isn't it?” Prison was once about recycling criminals into productive members of society. Now, it seemed nothing more than a warning against those contemplating lawlessness. It was Hell. “I've been trying to keep my head down.” He failed on multiple petty brawls. “For him... them.”

It was all for the kid. That little promise, that baby gave him a reason.

“I'll start polishing your medal,” Raylan replied. “Then you can take it and screw off, but leave Tim and that boy alone.”

“We have a son.”

“No,” he corrected, “Tim has a son. All you've got is about ten months left on a _very_ generous prison sentence.”

“I missed the part where any of this is your business,” Colt argued. He could respect Raylan being a loyal friend, but not when it infringed on his rights.

“You know what's funny?” he chuckled. “How much you claim to be a good man— a family man just waitin' to happen if given the chance— but you still ain't even asked me what the kid's name is.”

“I...” It was not that Colt never thought about what his kid might be called, but Raylan hardly gave him the chance for a more traditional conversation about it. He did want to know. “What's his name?”

Raylan could have been a bastard and withheld the information. After all, any alternatives for finding out were limited. Colt actually depended on the marshal to tell him. Luckily, Raylan wanted to share. He took satisfaction from it.

“Mark Gutterson,” he informed. “Don't know if he did that to honor a friend or remind himself how much he hates you, but... I'd split the chips and bet on both, personally.”

“Mark.”

God damn it! Colt made one big mistake in the heat of the moment, and now he would be reminded of it for the rest of his life. Tim made certain of it by tainting their son like a punishment.

“All right.” There was nothing he could do about it. “Mark Gutterson.”

Never Mark Rhodes. Never Baby Rhodes with a name that might let Colt forget what he did.

Damn it.

If Colt met his son— _when_ he met him— he would have to call the kid by that name. Tim knew what he did.

“Just do me a favor, all right?” Colt asked.

“Yeah,” Raylan replied, “I'll get right on it, I promise.” If sarcasm were meant to be subtle, he butchered the attempt.

“It's not for me,” Colt claimed. “Not... entirely for me.” He benefited. “Just... tell him I'm clean, yeah? Tell him I'm thinking clearly for the first time in a year.”

“Uh-huh.”

“He wants to know,” Colt asserted. It was true despite his lack of evidence. It had to be true. He meant something to Tim, however small— microscopic, even. “He just doesn't want to ask.”

“I'll see if it comes up in conversation,” Raylan said, having nothing but contempt for Colt and being nothing but a bastard. “Say goodbye, Colton.”

“Goodbye, Colton.”

Colt hung up the phone, glad to be done with the man, and went back to his monotonous day. The interruption was welcome, though, for multiple reasons.

That morning, Colt had two dates he counted down. Now, there was only one. Now, it was twice as special.

He got out in ten months.

He had a son when he did.


	14. At the Gate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last chapter!
> 
> Also, I'm actually not a big fan of the naming baby after another character thing, but it really did fit for this situation so I allowed.

“Rhodes,” called the clerk, instructing him to step forward.

Colt waited almost two years for the day, and now that it arrived, he was an angel on his best behavior. He approached the desk as asked, signed all his paperwork, received a change of civilian clothes not his own but in his size. After all, the attire he went in with had a few holes and red stains.

Colt went along with everything at his release. His conduct did not sour until a guard said, “U.S. Marshal here to escort you.”

“Excuse me?”

“Marshal outside,” the guard repeated.

“I don't need an escort,” Colt stated. “I'm a free man now.” He knew it was not lawful procedure, just as he knew who was out there: Raylan Givens. The man drove all the way there to threaten Colt a little, maybe drive him out of Kentucky. Anything to keep him away from Tim. “I'll take a cab.”

“He insists.”

Colt controlled his snarl into a frown. “Fine.” He would speak with Raylan and tell the man exactly where he could drive his car.

There were windows in the prison and yard time every day, and yet a free sun outside seemed exponentially brighter as it shone into his eyes. Colt blinked at the glare, and when his eyes adjusted, he saw the black vehicle waiting for him outside the fence— a large one. Tim leaned against the hood.

Colt's steps faltered and the loud buzz of the gate startled him. He walked through his opening and to his insistent escort. Tim pushed off his car to meet Colt halfway.

“Hey.” It was not an eloquent greeting, but Colt excused his lack of poetry on the surprise which still gripped him. He did not consider to consider what he might say to Tim, not so soon.

“Hey.” The man was similarly short of phrase.

Letting optimism possess him at this unexpected meeting, he thought the gifts might continue their flow. “Where's the, uh... Where's the ankle-biter?” Colt peeked around Tim's unencumbering shoulder to look at the SUV, only to be blocked out by the windows' dark tint. “Where's... Mark?”

“Sitter,” Tim answered.

“And do I get to see him?” It was a good question. “Ever?”

“Depends.” It was a fight to get more than one word out of him. Colt indulged the treatment and played his part.

“Depends on what?”

“For starters,” Tim said, “if you pass the do-it-yourself drug test I got in the car. Parents like to use 'em on their kids. Figure I gotta watch you just about as close.”

“I've been in the clink,” Colt grinned. “How the hell would I be on drugs?”

“Well, ain't you just the innocent little wallflower who kept his head down and never heard a good goddamn whisper of contraband,” Tim derided. He did not appreciate being taken for a fool. He knew how the world worked. He knew prisons streamlined crime almost as well as a back alley.

“I'll take your test,” Colt declared, and after being riled, the agreement was more to prove Tim wrong than to see his son. “You got a test for nicotine, I'll take that too.”

“That so?” Tim replied. “I think I'm almost impressed you managed to kick that one in prison.”

“It's not like that anymore,” he said. “People smoking, trading sticks like cash. Better currencies inside nowadays.” There was a large selection of ramen noodles and commissary goods that made for more desirable exchanges. “Besides,” Colt continued, “can't say I have the lungs for it anymore even if I did want one.” He pulled down the collar of his shirt to display two dark and twisted craters in his chest. “Baby mama shot me.”

“Ain't that just pure country,” Tim remarked, joking about it despite himself.

“What's the plan here?” Colt questioned. God, he wanted— needed— a cigarette.

“What makes you think I'd know?” Tim countered. Just because he was a step ahead, showing up unexpectedly, did not mean he thought very far past that.

“Fair enough.” They would play it by ear.

“Figure you ruined any shot I had of getting you into the Marshal's Service,” Tim said, “now you got an actual record and all.”

“I thank you for the hypothetical character reference all the same,” Colt replied.

“You got any sorta job lined up?” Tim asked him, and Colt knew the answer was meant to be carefully chosen.

“Got the address of a halfway house,” he said. “Figure I might start there.”

“Need a ride?” Tim offered. It was a generous suggestion but one with many strings attached.

“Nah,” Colt declined. “I'll probably pop in, say hi to a few friends first.”

“I know you will,” Tim stated, hearing what he expected to hear. The only friends Colt had in that county— or even the state— were Boyd Crowder and his ilk. “So get your ass in the goddamned car, Colt.”

It was not debatable. The marshal insisted. Colt would walk Tim's tightrope for miles just to see where it led, to see if he could meet his son, to see how the man still felt about him, to see what sort of future was in it for them. He would walk it for miles— and he hoped Tim never found his final straw.

For the moment, getting in the car, taking a drug test, it was all easy demands.

Colt could do that.

“Hey, deputy dawg,” he called as he walked around the car. “I had a pair of sunglasses on me before I got shot. Weren't in my personal effects when I checked out. You know anything about that?”

Tim shrugged. “Guess somebody must've stole 'em.”

He put on his sunglasses and opened the car.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So that's where I'm stopping it. Because I really don't know how things work for them moving forward. I hope for the best, but Colt did kill Tim's friend. It's a mess. It'd be nice if they can both blame a fair amount of Colt's behavior on the drugs and nice if Colt really did improve himself in prison, but who knows.
> 
> In a perfect world, they would move on from it, fall in love, get married, raise their son. Happy hypothetical ending, yay!
> 
> But honestly, just imagine whatever you want. And please, please, PLEASE review if you liked it! ♥


End file.
